Bob thought it was like a big air-mobile operation in the ’Nam, an orchestration of elements all moving in perfect syncopation and held together by some command hotshot on the radio network, as the various units through whose sector Flashlight moved called in their reports.
“Ah, Base Six, this is Ginger Dragon Two, we have all quiet in our secure zone at present,” he heard Payne speak into the phone.
“That’s a roger, Ginger Dragon Two, we’re reading you, our apprehension teams are on instant standby.”
“Anything yet?” Timmons now asked him. He was a large, dour man, whose belly pressed outward against his uniform; he seemed nervous.
Bob’s eye was in the scope. Though the target was so much farther out, he could see three ramshackle arched openings under the crown of the steeple, each louvered closed, each dirty and untouched.
“It’s the middle window,” Payne now said calmly.
“I know what window it is,” Bob said. Why were these guys talking so much? “I have no movement.”
“Maybe he’s not there yet,” said Timmons.
“Oh, he’s there. It’s too close to time. He’s there.”
If he’s anywhere, Bob thought, he’s there. He’s sitting very still now and though we can’t see him, he’s drawing himself together for the shot. He’s probably taken as close as can be constructed to this shot a thousand or so times, maybe ten thousand times. I know I would if I were in his shoes. But he’s a little nervous; he’ll want to be alone and he’ll want it quiet. If there are others in the room with him, then they’re just sitting there, not making any noise, letting him accumulate his strength.
According to Colonel Davis, a very skilled FBI embassy penetration team had discreetly planted light-sensitive sensors in the belfry, and the sensors had recorded data to suggest that every night between four and five A.M. a working party of five men entered the room and made preparations. Bob assumed they were soundproofing the walls and building a shooting platform to get the proper angle into the president’s site fourteen hundred far yards away. At the precise moment, three or four of the louvers would be removed; he’d scope and shoot and the team would replace the louvers. The window of vulnerability was maybe ten seconds.
“Ginger Dragon Six, we are beginning our apprehension maneuver.”
“Keep it discreet, apprehension teams.” Bob recognized Colonel Davis, who was running this operation, the one concealed within the larger drama of the president’s arrival and security.
“Fuckin’ A,” said Payne, “they getting ready to nab the sucker.”
Bob looked at his watch; it was only 1115 hours now, still an hour from the shooting event.
“Man, I hope your Federal team has got it together. This is a very nervous cat, he’s got spotters himself making sure he hasn’t been blown.”
“These are the very best guys,” Payne said. “These guys have been training for this one a long time. Lots and lots of dues gonna get paid off today, I can tell you. It’s payback time.”
Something melodramatic and movielike in Payne today irritated Bob.
“Ginger Dragon Two, you have the best angle on the target, you have anything to announce?”
“He’s talking to you, Swagger.”
“That’s a negative. But if they’re there, they probably came in late last night; and they’ll be real quiet. Tell him that. Lack of activity is to be expected.”
“Uh, Ginger Dragon Six, this is Dragon Two, uh, spotter has a negative so far.”
“Is he sure?”
“Oh, Christ,” said Bob. “Tell him they’re there, goddammit, and that I’ll sing out when I get a visual confirm, and that that will be at the point of shooting, and goddammit, he better get set to bounce his people in there fast.”
Now wasn’t the time to begin doubting the scenario. They all believed in the scenario, they’d discussed it dispassionately all afternoon yesterday.
“Uh, confidence here is still high, Dragon Six,” said Payne.
That’s what ruined operations and that’s what killed people in the field – that sudden, last-minute spurt of doubt, like the lash of a whip: it made people morons. So many times Bob had seen it; it was exactly what sniping wasn’t.
“We may have to go early,” said Ginger Dragon Six.
“Do that, and you got nothing,” said Bob. “He’s there. Goddamn, I can feel him. Oh, he’s there and he’s on his rifle, and he’s just settling into it.”
He wished he had a rifle too.
“Okay, Alpha Team, this is Base Six, Flashlight’s ETA is now just five minutes.”
“Base Six to Alpha, Flashlight is now in your zone.”
“We have Flashlight, thank you, Base Six, good job.”
“Roof Team, this is Base Six, any activity?”
“Negative, Six, all clear except for our people.”
“Keep me informed, Roof Team, we are near maximum vulnerability now.”
“Have you, Six.”
“All teams, Max V condition, on your toes, people, on your toes.”
On his toes! Nick felt so out of it he almost had to laugh. This is your life, Nick Memphis. He sat in the car alone in a zone so barren of life it seemed despoiled, or some vista in a sci-fi movie set after the end of the world. All the tourists had hustled on by to get a look-see at the president. Here he was, on the far outside.
Now he saw it. The motorcade hurtled down North Rampart, and just briefly the gates to the park were opened, and through it sped Flashlight’s three-million-dollar Lincoln which no bullet could penetrate, sixteen New Orleans motorcycle cops, the Security Detail quick reaction van, and two cars of reporters and TV people. And then they were gone.
Man, he thought, I’m so far to the outside there is no inside.
He tried to stay alert out of respect for the ritual, and the big Smith in the pancake holster was some help. It gouged him but in his curious way he enjoyed it.
Yet always he felt a little guilt. He’d gotten the easy part: for he knew that the forty minutes of Max V as Flashlight was exposed were absolutely the most terrifying – and exhilarating – for the Secret Service agents who now ran the show.
“Ah, Alpha Four to Alpha Response, I have a squirrel in the fourth row left, can we get a team on him, please, like really fast, guys.”
It was the Crowd Squad, working the people.
“Alpha Four, the Hispanic guy, right, black over-coat?” came Mueller’s response from the roof of the Municipal Auditorium just beside the podium that had been erected in front of a wading pool.
“That’s my squirrel. Guy’s got a shifty, stressed look and his hands are in his pockets. I can’t tell if he’s by himself.”
“Ah, okay, Alpha, we’re moving in.”
The crowd squad maneuvered quickly to neutralize the guy they’d ID’d as a possible. Nick envied them the action even if, as it did 999 out of a thousand times, it turned out to be groundless.
“Okay, Alpha Four, the squirrel just lifted his little girl up to see the Man, and he’s got three other kids with him.”
“Back off then, Alpha Four, good work.”
Nick heard cheers and laughter echoing through the empty streets; the president had made a joke. He checked his watch. They were running a bit behind schedule. It was almost noon and the speech was scheduled to have started at 11:45, but it had just gotten under way. He’d seen the site plan, amazed at how precisely these things are choreographed. There’d even been a rehearsal for the Security Detail to get them used to body moves, to the look of the situation, so that if something ungodly happened, the place at least would be familiar to them.
But Nick could remember from the site plan where Flashlight would be standing, where the archbishop would be, flanked by his own bodyguard. The rest of the guys up there were Service beef, two staff assistants, and Mr. Football, as they called the Air Force staff colonel who was always a discreet ten feet from Flashlight with a briefcase full of that day’s nuclear go-codes. Nick could imagine them up there in the love and glee of the crowd, these happy men who ruled the world, and who would not even in their older age remember this day.